Times of India
Saibal Dasgupta,TNN
August 26, 2015,
BEIJING: Chinese president Xi Jinping has asked officials to alter school curriculum of Tibetan children in order to incorporate “core socialist values”.
This is part of China’s preparations to bring about major changes in the thinking of the next generation of Tibetans at a time when the Dalai Lama is aging, and Beijing is getting ready to appoint a successor of its choice, observers said. The Communist Party sees the Dalai Lama as a major obstacle in enforcing its idea of a socialist society among Tibetans.
Xi also asked officials to strive hard for in calculating “Party-loving and patriotic builders and successors of the socialist cause,” among children in Tibet and four other provinces with heavy Tibetan population. He also called for wider use of Mandarin China, which is different from the Tibetan language, describing it as “the national commonly-used language and script”.
Besides rapid development, the government wants to create more employment opportunities for Tibetans to prevent them from taking what Beijing regards as regressive steps in support of the Dalai Lama and his supporters.
“More active employment policies should be carried out to help residents of all ethnic groups to walk out of their farms and pastors to work in towns and companies and start businesses,” Xi said at an official meeting on Tibet’s development in Beijing.
He also pledged to continue with preferential policies for Tibetan inhabited areas, and bring about sustainable development. These areas have entered “a critical stage” toward fulfilling the country’s goal of building a moderately prosperous society in a comprehensive way, the president, who is also general secretary of the Communist Party said.
He said Tibetan areas in five provinces, Tibet, Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu and Qinghai– will continue to enjoy special financial, tax and investment policies. Efforts would be made to improve living conditions for various ethnic groups, he said.
Speaking on the occasion, Chinese premier Li Keqiang said that it is an arduous task for Tibet to build a “moderately prosperous” society over the next five years.
He promised to give top priority to improving people’s livelihood, alleviating poverty and increasing employment among Tibetans, he noted, urging more efforts to boost education, medical care and social security in the region.
“Efforts should be given to the development of agriculture and animal husbandry and related processing business, making Tibet an important tourism destination in the world, and promoting commerce and trade with South Asia to boost the Tibetan economy,” he added.
Li also called for speeding up construction of local infrastructure should be sped up, including transportation networks, water conservation projects, power grids, among others.
